Looting Dead PCs

[Arnwyn]

So, my questions are:
Do other people play this way? IE, no thought to following a lawful inheritance policy, or following the wishes of the deceased.

Yes, pretty much. (Though it's not entirely unheard of for someone to have such wishes - but generally such a thing is very rare in our games. In fact, almost all of the time the deceased wishes are for the rest of the party to loot his body...!)

Does this bother anyone else, or is it just me?

Just you. () It doesn't bother me.

 

[lukelightning]

PCs should really bury their fallen comrades. That way they get enough piety points to make up for the orphanage they burnt down.

 

[sckeener]

offtopic, but this reminds me of a story. There was a player that wanted to start a new character and he hated another player. So he decided to have his character commit suicide. He couldn't do it himself, so he told the player he hated that he was secretly a werewolf. He went on to add that tonight when he changed, he was going to kill that player's character.

Needless to say the player got his suicide wish when he was stabbed to death with a normal sword (this was 1st edition). Amazingly the city watch turned up rather quickly as they'd gotten an annoymous tip that a murder was going to take place and they walked up right on cue. The murderer tried to defend himself saying he was killing a werewolf....the guards of course asked if he used his sword...his non-silver sword....off to jail he went.

What made me think of it was there was a Will and the new character got all the possessions of the murder victim....nice way to bring a new character into the game

 

[lukelightning]

This is something DMs who forbid raise dead need to think about. It's easier on the game if the player brings a character back to life rather than making a new character. If you force players to make new characters then the major source of their loot could very well be dead PCs, as every time they make a new character they bring in more stuff.

I just assume that the PCs at some point have discussed what should be done in case of death. I have no problem with the player of a dead character saying "you should bring me back to life" or "take my weapons but give my shield to the temple" even post-mortem; we can all pretend that the arrangements were made beforehand.

When my character dies I virtually push all my junk on the other players. "Hey, you should take may magic chain shirt. Here's a wand for you. I have these scrolls too!"

 

[JohnSnow]

I managed to instill a sense of honor in my PC's.

Primary and secondary weapons of the deceased, along with their best suit of armor, and their any favored magical items (which would be redundant or useless for other players) get buried. Incidentals in their backpacks (things like sunrods, healing potions, Spare cash) get redistributed.

*chuckle*

Yeah, treat the deceased with honor. Characters should be buried with honor (or placed on a boat, funeral pyre, or something else appropriate), like Boromir in The Lord of the Rings. Of course, I usually allow a deceased the honor of a few last words (can't happen by the rules, but it makes sense). So he can bequeath his sword if he chooses.

Otherwise, the gods might get angry. Or the character might return to menace his companions as a vengeful revenant or ghost.

What? Magic's fun!

 

[Vanye]

Dude! Think of the Piety Points!

That'll totally make up for that orphanage we burned down...

 

[Snapdragyn]

My actions as a player depend on my character in this.

For some of my characters (like the assassin), it's a simple matter of practicality; the stiff isn't going to need the stuff where he's going, & the rest of us could use it (or the coin it'll bring).

OTOH, my barbarian once accidently killed a fellow party member (confusion spell effect).That was actually a very fun RP scene (ok, maybe not so much for the player of the dead guy); I got a tremble in my voice & my lip was quivering with the (rp'd) emotion of the tragedy as my poor dumb brute came out from under the spell effects & the others explained to him what he'd done. He refused to allow anyone in the party to take so much as a copper from the corpse; I believe that seeing the guy scream & use his dagger to hack off his own long hair in ragged chunks with the blood of the fallen comrade still staining him creating a pretty good impression that he was not to be trifled with at the time. He cut off one finger to keep for later rezzing possibilities, then built a small cairn right there in the tunnels of the Temple of Elemental Evil (of course, if he'd been brighter he probably would've realized that this wasn't the greatest resting place, lol).

 

[lukelightning]

Bury and loot 'em?

Definitely loot them, but burying?!?!? What a waste. What you do is create greater undead to make your buddy into a wraith, and then raise the body as a zombie.

 

[Arrgh! Mark!]

Characters swimming through blade infested water; one dies to a giant octopus.

When they eventually get the body back they loot it and hack it to pieces for the octopus so they can swim through the water themselves.


Not what I was expecting.

But Age of Worms does things to PC's. It makes them apprieciate trying new members. They might be eaten first.

Death Count: 26.

 

[Umbran]

Voila, the party just increased their overall wealth by 25%, and all because one PC died. Looks like a reward to me.

It isn't a reward if, to compensate, you hold off on major gold or magic treasure until the party is back near the guidelines again. If "loot the dead party member" = "no new goodies until you've gone up a level", they're far more likely to send the wealth off to the relatives, or something.

But really, looting the dead isn't such a big deal. I've had far more problems when the party decides to loot the living